[center][b][h2][color=f26522]Jonathan McCord[/color][/h2][/b][/center]

The autoloader dropped in another AC5 slug with the muffled, yet satisfying clang of the magazine pushing the next round into place right behind Jon’s shoulder. He shifted a little in the straps and the machine beneath him reacted with his neural input, shifting its armored shoulders and weapon-laden gauntlets slightly like a fighter staying loose in his stance. The difficult tracking shots on the technicals earlier had been a healthy warmup so much so that putting rounds into the suspension of the massive, slow moving, [i]Gonggong[/i] was like shooting at a barn door. Shot after shot, steel and energized particles striking as one. He was feeling his oats and every trigger pull was hitting like a fastball hitting the catcher’s mitt tearing into the unarmored suspension and heavy gearing. The temperature in the cockpit built up heartily and outside the massive turbines on the back of the [i]Marauder[/i]’s insectoid body whirred angrily, distorting the smoky air with dissipated heat. Having spent a vast swath of his life piloting [i]Ossie[/i], Jon knew where the gauge was without looking. The next volley put him right on the edge of shutdown and [i]Bitchin’ Betty’s[/i] digitized voice calmly noted as much in his helmet, but he held his rhythm briefly watching Sergeant Dalton lead the APCs alongside the train.

There was an odd twist in the lead car and the whole train shifted trajectory as the Knight’s APCs went out of view behind it and the giant train veered off the road and started plowing angrily across the open landscape as if it were trying to steer clear of the mech lance and take the most direct route possible towards the dam regardless of terrain. Jon reckoned whoever was driving must’ve been bodied by Dalton’s troopers or had locked the controls on the new path or both. The colossal machine pressed forward doggedly dragging the mangled undercarriage and carving out waves of earth and stone beneath it. For the first time, Jon really thought it looked like something mythical and he could feel his adrenaline surge at the prospect of possible death. When the satchel charges erupted, he felt himself a little bit jealous of the Knight’s infantry, climbing on the side of what was probably the Inner Sphere’s biggest suicide bomb and throwing down with a bunch of fanatics at close quarters. He smirked a bit at their sheer refusal to lose and equally fanatical boarding action. When a turret popped up, aiming down the line at the third car to harass the ‘Boys, he zipped an AC5 slug right over the top of the train’s hull, decapitating the position like plinking a beer can off a tractor fender and he felt satisfied that he had made up for missing the dirt bike earlier.

“[color=f26522]Copy that, Buckshot. Lead car is danger-close.[/color]” 

Now that the location of the bomb had been determined, it was essentially open-season on the lead car and the bellow of the Von Luckner’s main gun signaled the end of the Knights’ patience with the Heavenly Sword. With its new heading, the land train had shown them a full broadside and the tank’s salvos smashed into it like mighty swings from a car-sized sledgehammer. Jon followed the tankers’ fire with his medium lasers, giving his heat sinks a chance to catch up and cutting into where the undercarriage had been opened up. His thumb dabbed at the AC5’s singular trigger, putting in another round every time the reloader cycled behind him. Being a precision shooter, he couldn’t come close to matching the broad swaths of damage dealt by the AC20. When the heat had fallen off enough, he looked quickly for something more exposed to make his next combined shot hit for more than the shredded linkage the Von Luckner was tearing off. Large chunks of hastily attached armor and debris were flung away as the machine’s sheer momentum began to destroy it as much as the combined fire of three mechs and a tank. [i]Gonggong[/i] plowed hard into a small depression then nosed up sharply again on the subsequent rise as if breaking a wave, showing its dirt-caked and smashed underside for a moment. The frame twisted slightly with the impact and Jon flicked the reticle under the dark shadow of the suspension, unsure of what he might have been aiming at, if anything important at all, and loosed a salvo straight into the belly of the lead car.